Inclusion and diversity

In Smurfit Kappa we promote all forms of diversity at all levels of the organisation.

At Smurfit Kappa, we know that diversity is the only thing that we have in common. Throughout the last 18 months we have taken a bottom-up approach to inclusion and diversity and been listening closely to our employees. A series of focus groups with a diverse cross-section of people were held to help us understand what makes a truly inclusive work environment.

Thousands of people’s voices and opinions led to us creating our EveryOne inclusion and diversity programme. EveryOne means all of us; every single person that makes up Smurfit Kappa who has something unique to give and hidden talents to unpack. EveryOne aims to make sure that each of us feels supported, accepted and respected in our daily work.

We believe in celebrating that diversity; our diverse cultures, diverse backgrounds and diverse ways of seeing the world. EveryOne asks that we all respect, support and accept each other; that we challenge our assumptions and keep our minds open every day.

Diversity is now embedded in the company’s ‘Open Leadership’ model as one of the nine leadership capabilities: ‘Open up and make the most of diversity’. Our leaders value diversity and use the new and different ideas that come from a diverse team.

Through our company’s engagement survey, MyVoice, we are able to monitor the perception of our 46,000 employees on diversity and inclusion, with specific questions set on this particular subject.

Within Smurfit Kappa, we address all common diversity issues, with a specific focus on gender gaps. We want an equal gender-balance in our graduate programmes and have at least 30% women as shortlisted external candidates for management vacancies.

We have reviewed the areas and roles where retention and advancement of women has the greatest potential. We also promoted female participation in our management training programmes – in our Graduate Programme, for instance, female participation is around 50% and in the Advanced Management Development programme, participation by women is stable at 30% since 2015. We also pay extra attention to female managers with high potential when reviewing our succession plans.

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